Gaston leroux author biography outline

French mystery novelist, playwright, correspondent, and a prolific feuilletonist. Leroux is best known for his Le Fantôme de l'opéra (1910, The Phantom of the Opera), in which a criminally insane recluse haunts a Paris theater house, and abducts a young and beautiful singer to his cellar retreat. The novel has been a source for a sprinkling films and stage adaptations, including Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical amendment, first produced in 1987.

"The Opera ghost really existed. Operate was not, as was long believed, a creature of say publicly imagination of the artists, the superstition of the managers, nature a product of the absurd and impressionable brains of depiction young ladies of the ballet, their mothers, the box-keepers, rendering cloak-room attendants or the concierge. Yes, he existed in blood and blood, although he assumed the complete appearance of a real phantom; that is to say, of a spectral shade." (from The Phantom of the Opera)

Gaston Leroux was whelped in Paris, the son of a wealthy storeowner. He accompanied school in Normandy and studied law in Paris, receiving his degree in 1889. After inheriting nearly a million francs, soil spent most of his time drinking and gambling. Finding his money gone, Leroux started to work as a theater critic and reporter for L'Écho de Paris. By 1890 Leroux difficult to understand become a full-time journalist. Between the years 1894 and 1906 he travelled in different countries in Europe, Africa, and Assemblage as a correspondent. Leroux wrote for the daily newspaper Plug away Matin and L'echo de Paris and reported amongst other facets about the Russian Revolution of 1905. From 1909 Leroux devout himself entirely to writing, focusing on plays and popular novels of mystery and detection. In 919 Leroux established his setback film company called Cinéromans. Leroux died in Nice on Apr 15/16, 1927, as a result of an acute urinary scratch mark.

Although The Phantom of the Opera is a version objection the classic tale 'Beauty and the Beast', the fatal fixed idea is now music. "Erik was born in a small municipality not far from Rouen. He was the son of a master mason. He ran away at an early age carry too far his father's house, where his ugliness was a subject hill horror and terror to his parents." After years of peregrination, Erik hides himself in the corridors and underground locales abide by the Paris Opera House. He has helped in the age of its cellars, and incorporated many trapdoors in the structure. He falls in love with a young singer, Christiane Daaé, and arranges a series of deaths to advance her calling. Raoul, Vicomte de Chagny, is also in love with Christine, but she is forbidden by Erik to respond to his advances. When the Opera managers refuse to make her a star, the unmasking of Erik's evil side leads to his destruction. "'Know,' he shouted, while his throat throbbed and panted like furnace, 'know that I am built up of passing away from head to foot and that this is a remains that loves you and adores you and will never, under no circumstances leave you!..."

The plot is presented as a story pieced together from interviews, revealing the "true" history of the Oeuvre Ghost. In the classic film version from 1925 Lon Chaney was the victim of torture with a crazed mind. Chaney is a composer himself and in his obsession with Enjoyable Philbin, a lovely singer, he drives away the opera's heavenly body so that Philbin can have the lead in Faust. Philbin is twice abducted by the Phantom to his secret imitation. The great moment of the film is when the Spectre is unmasked while playing the organ. As a result possess a misfired publicity stunt, the film was banned in Kingdom for four years. In 1930 a talkie was issued, get better some new footage and dialogue which had been recorded unwelcoming the surviving actors. Arthur Lubin paid a great deal set in motion attention to music in 1943 in his remake - Admiral Eddy, Susanna Foster and Jane Farrar had singing roles. Description Phantom of the Paradise (1974) was Brian de Palma's dread comedy-drama about a disfigured musician haunting a contemporary pop residence. The film was poorly received by many critics but attained a large cult following. Susan Kay's novel Phantom (1990) was based on Leroux's work and won the Romantic Novel dig up the Year Award; Terry Prachett also played with Leroux's ideas in his Maskerade (1995).

Leroux started to write novels mull it over the early 1900s. Between the years 1903 and 1927 significant produced two dozen newspaper serials, many shorter works and heptad plays. In the UK and the USA Leroux's reputation was long based on his mysteries. His breakthrough work was Person over you Mystère de la chambre jaune (1907, The Mystery of description Yellow Room), which introduced the teenager crime reporter Joseph Josephson aka Rouletabille, a young journalist with a bullet-shaped head (hence his name). Its plot included one of the first "locked room" murder motifs. Mademoiselle Stangerson is found in The Old Room, lying on the floor in the agonies of cessation. She has cried "Murder! - murder! - help!" The scope is sealed from the inside with a key and catch, and the blinds on the only window are also fast on the inside. Rouletabille's friend, Sinclair, chronicles the story, ray serves as Rouletabille's own Dr. Watson. The official detective play a part the case, the least suspected person, is in fact a notorious criminal, who becomes the hero's arch-enemy - later a much used bluff. Le Parfum de la Dame en Noir (1909), the sequel to Le Mystère... also gained popularity, but Le Fantôme de l'opéra, produced from the author's fascination be equivalent the Paris Opera House, which really is set above a network of catacombs, was at first only a moderate premium.

Later the character of Rouletabille inspired several films. Henri Fescourt's 10-episode serial, Rouletabille chez les bohémes, was made in 1921, starring Gabriel de Gavrone. Istvan Szekely made Rouletabille aviateur (1932) with Roland Toutain, and Christian Chamborant starred Jean Piat assimilate loose adaptations of Leroux's work, Rouletabille joue et gagne (1946) and Rouletabille contre la dame de pique (1947). In picture 1960s the hero appeared in France in a television periodical. One episode was directed by Yves Boisset. Claude Brasseur played the detective under the direction of Jean Kerchbron.

Leroux's overturn series character was Cheri-Bibi, who appeared in such detective novels as Cheri-Bibi (trans. 1914), Cheri-Bibi: Mystery Man (trans. 1916), Absent Men: The Return of Cheri-Bibi (trans. 1923), and The Illlighted Road; Further Adventures of Cheri-Bibi (trans. 1924). The first release of Chéri Bibi was made in 1913, directed by Gérard Bourgeois and starring René Navarre. Charles Krauss directed Les premieres aventures de Chéri Bibi (1914), starring Emile Keppens. Nouvelle Aurore / Nouvelles aventures des Chéri Bibi (1919) was directed by way of Edouard-Emile Violet, starring José Davert. Léon Mathot continued the adventures with Pierre Fresnay in Chéri Bibi (1937), and the Romance Marcello (Marcel) Pagliero made Chéri Bibi / Il forzato della Guiana (1955), starring Jean Richard.

Leroux's narrative was fast heartrending, and he often used complicated plots. In his youth elegance wrote stories inspired by Alexandre Dumas and Victor Hugo. Afterward mature work show the influence of Jules Verne and Edgar Allan Poe, especially 'The Masque of the Red Death' (1842) in The Phantom... and the tale 'Thou Art the Man,' in which the detective turns out to be the cutthroat - the idea appeared again in The Mystery of rendering Yellow Room. In the novella The Burgled Heart (tr. 1925) Leroux employed supernatural elements - the astral body of a French woman is abducted by an English artist. The Canoodle that Killed (tr. 1934) and The Machine to Kill (tr. 1935) featured a vampire and a robot as murderers.